147
📚Praise the LORD 📖!For it is good to sing
praises to our God;
for it is pleasant 📖 and praise is
beautiful 📖.
2 📚The LORD builds 📖 up Jerusalem.
He gathers 📖 together the exiles
of Israel.
3 📚He heals the brokenhearted
and binds up their wounds.
4 📚He counts the number
of the stars;
he calls them all by their
names.
147:4 God can gently lay one hand on a wounded heart and with the other hold far distant galaxies. The one who has regard for the lowly is so great He can name every star in the universe. Though there are only a few thousand stars visible to the naked eye, beyond the visible stars there are multiplied billions, crores upon crores - crore is 10 million, a host so vast that man can hardly even estimate the number. God knows them all, made them all.⚜
5 📚Great 📖 is our Lord
and mighty in power.
His understanding 📖 is
infinite.
6 📚The LORD lifts up the meek 📖.
He hurls the wicked down to
the ground 📖.
7 📚Sing to the LORD with thanksgiving 📖.
Sing praise on the harp
to our God,
8 📚Who covers the heavens
with clouds,
who prepares rain for the earth,
who makes grass grow
on the mountains.
9 📚He gives to the beast its food,
and to the young ravens
which cry out.
147:8-9 After creating the world God did not withdraw to some distant place. Clouds and rain do not come merely because of some natural laws. God is active in nature (Ps 104:10-15; 135:6-7; 148:8).⚜
10 📚He does not delight in the strength of
the horse;
he does not take pleasure
in the legs of a man.
11 📚The LORD takes pleasure in those
who fear him,
in those who hope in his mercy.
147:10-11 Verses 16-18; Ps 33:16-18; 103:11; 1 Sam 16:7; Heb 11:6. For fear of God see notes at Ps 34:11-14. God delights in good inward qualities that He produces in individuals, not in outward appearance or physical strength.⚜
12 📚Praise the LORD, O Jerusalem!
Praise your God, O Zion!
13 📚For he has strengthened the
bars of your gates.
He has blessed your children
within you.
14 📚He makes peace in your
borders,
and fills you with the finest
of the wheat.
147:12-14 See Ps 48:1. Who was there in all the earth to praise the LORD (Jehovah) if Jerusalem did not? No other people had received such blessings as Israel. Now it is the duty and privilege of believers in Christ to praise Him, for now we are the people blessed by the Lord of heaven and earth.⚜
15 📚He sends out his command on
earth;
his word runs very swiftly.
147:15 See Ps 33:9; Job 37:12; Isa 55:11. God can and does give commands to any part of His creation (1 Kings 17:2-4, 9; Mark 4:39-41). Only sinful men and Satan disobey Him.⚜
16 📚He gives snow like wool;
he scatters the frost like ashes.
17 📚He hurls out his hail like fragments;
who can stand before his cold?
18 📚He sends out his word and
melts them.
He causes his wind to blow,
and the waters flow.
19 📚He declares his word to Jacob,
his statutes and his judgments
to Israel.
20 📚He has not done so with any
other nation;
and as for his judgments,
they have not known them.
Praise the LORD!
147:20 Deut 4:7-8, 32-34. Then the people of Israel were a repository for the Word of God as Christ’s church is now.⚜